Who can you trust? The Police and state propaganda war

A very strange (long) weekend, a good one for royalists, bad one for anarchists and the Met Police, and complete headache for Osama Bin Laden (it’s OK, he went for a US government sanctioned swim :-P).

No link between those? Well in all three events the media has been used and spun to either pre-convict protesters as all dangerous anarchists and to threaten anyone who dares protest that it wouldn’t be allowed, or deny someone was unlawfully killed by police at every stage and try and hide and obscure it a la Blair Peach, or a strange shifting story of killed then not killed wives, guns being fired and then not, and lack of evidence and a sudden strange hypersensitivity to Islam that wasn’t really there in the last 10 years. Not to mention the news-speke of ‘ammonia filled lightbulbs’ of previous months (have you ever tried to open up a lightbulb, let alone fill it with anything?). That’s not to say that Osama didn’t play up or invent these fantasy narratives – a wonderful bedfellow boogie-man for the USA. It’s a weird dance or death spiral with us all sandwiched inbetween these people.

The lone beacon of good news is the verdict of unlawful killing in the case of Ian Tomlinson…for once justice is seemed to be done, although the sceptic in me thinks Simon Harwood will go the way of Alan Murray in the case of Blair Peach – fingered but not prosecuted. Prosecuting a police officer is always balked at by juries usually. I hope he doesn’t return to the Met though, and sorts out his anger issues.

Really we are now in a strange psyops propaganda world where the battle like with Osama is purely symbolic, where ‘truth’ is accepted and not questioned even when it seems as fishy as what’s nibbling Bin Laden’s toes. The Met has repeatedly lied or denied in many cases recently, there’s a good article about these trust issues here – and a rather scary report from a transgender member of Queer Resistance, part of the Zombie Flash mob in Soho Square…Met ‘diversity’ and gender issues trainers, read that and weep – yes we still have people who have to ‘check’ someone’s gender by doing what sounds even worse than the ‘touch my junk’ the TSA did on me when I asked not to go through the backscatter coming back from the States (they were great actually, and it wasn’t that invasive, my bag was less happier though).

And the idea you dump the body of the World’s Most Wanted Man (well if you think the world is America) into the ocean – understandably not wanting a shrine to Osama – without independent verification and expecting your enemies and critics just to buy your story and trust implicitly what you say is incredulous to say the least. Maybe Osama will become the new Elvis and appear in your local laundromat singing his best hits or something…or pal up with his friends Abominable Snowman and Nessie for a full tour of remote parks everywhere? Have people really become that unquestioning at what is pumped at them by the media and state? It seems so by the actions of such authorities.

Also disturbing how if true in the case of the arrested QR members how frank they were about not letting anyone ‘spoil Kate and Wills big day’ – I thought the police were there to solve crime, not stop protests as part of a political protection of the state or royalty? Even admitting keeping someone there til the wedding is over, you can’t keep or arrest someone just because you ‘might’ think they’ll do a crime – that’s Minority Report not real life.

But bullshit has a (un)welcome ring and in all these cases language was used pre-emptively to spin the whole precedings, or in some cases lie knowing that the media will have moved onto the next story before it comes out those ‘lightbulbs’ and ‘guns’ and ‘weapons of mass destruction’ weren’t there. Sad when you hoped the likes of Obama would open up transparency rather than keeping on the cloak and dagger or lies of previous administrations…because that just feeds the cranks and fundamentalists, but recently I’ve felt herded too close to Truther nuttiness for my liking since the official stories do not ring true…they are lying to us all…and like in 2003 with Blair and Iraq just are not really caring if they are caught out as they can shout louder?

What Time Is It?

Radio Clash was probably the longest continuously running music podcast (it ran 10 years from Nov 2004 to Nov 2014) and one of the first music podcasts in the UK.
Originally only about mashup culture, but since extended to a live music station and blog which are very much still alive, talking about politics, sex, drugs and rock and roll. All posts are probably at least a little bit NSFW, because if it's that safe, then why post it?